Police stunned by the assassination in Caesarea: "We have not seen anything like this; suspicion of a 'red kippah'"

Following a situation assessment held by investigators of the Central Unit (YAMAR) of the Hof District Police, led by District Commander Superintendent Yehiel Bohdana and Police Commissioner Lieutenant General Dani Levy, and after the YAMAR commander, Colonel Yoni Hagag, reviewed the list of open conflicts involving the victim, Yanis Yeshubayev, it is clear to the police that such a cold-blooded assassination will lead to revenge and may trigger a series of serious incidents that could shake Hadera and its surroundings.

During the assessment, police examined security camera footage and analyzed the behavior of the victim. From the footage, it appears that when he descended the stairs from the restaurant entrance and the killer passed by him, Yeshubayev did not recognize the person who killed him, and it did not raise any suspicion on his part. The video shows two others descending alongside the victim, while the killer, with inexplicable cold-bloodedness and audacity, passes by them, reaches the restaurant entrance, and then turns toward the deceased, draws a pistol, and fires directly into his head at point-blank range, as if executing him.

The deceased collapsed to the floor, and attempts to save his life were unsuccessful. Shortly after he was evacuated from the scene to the hospital, his death was pronounced. The YAMAR investigators, led by Hagag, who have already seen audacious incidents, mainly in the Arab sector, are not familiar with such events in the Jewish sector. The fact that the deceased did not recognize his killer raised questions as to whether the killer, a cold-blooded professional, wore a mask and thus managed to remain unidentified.

At the same time, this assessment was not at the center of the situation evaluation. The police do not rule out the possibility that it was a contract killer, whom the victim did not know, and who arrived to carry out the assassination after receiving precise intelligence about the target, executing the mission within a few seconds.

The fact that the killer did not fire at the other people present and took the risk that they would not try to neutralize him also raised the theory that it might be a 'red kippah' (ambush) exercise, when Yeshubayev left the restaurant at a timing that was coordinated with the killer and his handlers, and then, unimpeded and in broad daylight, the chilling assassination was carried out.

YAMAR investigators will analyze the entire list of Yeshubayev's rivals and examine who among them was capable of hiring a contract killer to carry out such an event in front of passersby, right at the entrance to a restaurant in Caesarea.